Barack and Michelle Obama both sit at number two as most admired man and woman in the world.

Courtesy of YouGov: 

Bill Gates and Angelina Jolie are once again the world’s most admired man and woman in YouGov’s annual study of which public figures the people of our planet look up to. 

Tech pioneer and philanthropist Gates has topped the list every time YouGov has conducted the survey, while Jolie has also come first in each of the three surveys since 2015 when separate male and female categories were introduced. 

In the US, former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama top the lists. 

This year, the study expanded to cover the views of people in 35 countries – the most ever – and means that YouGov interviewed more than 37,000 people to compile the list.

Interestingly enough YouGov offers another graphic which shows that there is only one country where Donald Trump is more admired that Barack Obama.

 Of course it's Russia.

But just barely.

Trump is NEVER going to emerge from Obama's shadow, no matter what he does.

The Doomsday Clock is now the closest it has been to midnight since the Cold War.

Courtesy of Science AF: 

On Wednesday, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists announced they have moved the Doomsday Clock forward so it now rests 2 minutes before midnight. 

The Doomsday Clock is a symbol which represents the likelihood of a man-made global catastrophe. Ever since 1998, when India and Pakistan started testing nuclear weapons, the Doomsday Clock has been just single digits away from midnight. 

But after the disaster that was 2017, when world leaders failed to respond effectively to looming threats of nuclear war and climate change, scientists have moved the minute hand forward by 30 seconds. 

The Clock is now closer than it has ever been to Doomsday since the height of the Cold War in 1953. 

"In 2017, we saw reckless language in the nuclear realm heat up already dangerous situations and relearned that minimizing evidence-based assessments regarding climate and other global challenges does not lead to better public policies," said Rachel Bronson, the Bulletin's president and CEO. 

According to the experts, last year's greatest threats came from the nuclear realm, leaving humanity on the "cusp of a new arms race." North Korea's nuclear weapons progress and the "hyperbolic rhetoric and provocative actions" from both the U.S. and North Korea have increased the possibility of nuclear war, they say.

People terrified around the world about the possibility of a nuclear war.

Somewhere you just know that Putin is sitting with a self satisfied grin on his face.

A population in fear, is a population easily manipulated.

And now for something completely different. The History of the World: Every Year.

This is why I now say that we are all Africans.

Because that is literally where we ALL came from.

I just watched this and let it wash over me.

My only complaint is that it all moves so fast after we get into the CE, though I appreciate how it all fades to black after 2016.

You know, when the Anti-Christ was elected.

Nobel Prize winners name Donald Trump as one of the top threats in the world.

Courtesy of Common Dreams:  

Along with nuclear war and climate change, President Donald Trump has made the list of what Nobel Laureates consider to be major risks to the world population. 

In a survey of 50 Nobel Prize winners in the sciences, medicine, and economics, more than a third of the respondents said damage to the environment brought about by issues like over-population and climate change, was the biggest threat to mankind. Twenty-three percent said nuclear war was their top concern, while six percent said theirs was "the ignorance of political leaders"—with two of the winners naming Trump specifically. 

Peter Agre, winner of the chemistry Prize in 2003, told the Times Higher Education, which conducted the poll and released the results Thursday, that "Trump could play a villain in a Batman movie—everything he does is wicked or selfish." He also called the president "extraordinarily uninformed." 

The survey also found serious concerns among the respondents about the brand of populism pushed by Trump as well as right-wing European leaders. Forty percent of the Nobel winners called Trump-style populism, characterized by his distrust of climate science and the media, and political polarization "a grave threat to scientific progress, while 30 percent say that they are a serious threat."

The only part of this which surprises me is that not more of these geniuses placed Trump as the major risk to the world population.

As for Trump playing a Batman character, he already did.

Or are all of you unfamiliar with Two-Face? 

Elections have consequences.

Courtesy of Axios: 

From 2015 to 2017, Pew Research tracked global confidence in the U.S. president "to do the right thing" regarding world affairs. While almost all the countries surveyed have lost confidence over the years, Russia's significant increase stands out — jumping from 11% in 2011 under Obama to 53% under Trump. 

Other takeaways from the report: Merkel, Xi or Putin have more positive ratings globally than Trump. Arrogant was the most common word globally associated with Trump's characteristics. There is global disapproval across all of Trump's major policy proposals.

We have to keep reminding ourselves that this only took six months.

Though the data is from 2015 and 2017, I can guarantee that the numbers from 2016 would have lined up almost perfectly with the data from 2015.

That means that in only a six month period of time Donald Trump has completely trashed the reputation of the presidency of the United States.

I cannot even begin to imagine how much worse it will be in another six months.

Vladimir Putin prepares to pounce as America's power in the world diminishes.

Courtesy of Newsweek: 

The opportunities that Moscow is eager to seize beyond Russia’s border are openings or cracks in the world order. The ability to ferret out opportunity, developed during the 1980s and 1990s, is helping Moscow’s rulers detect such chances now. 

Both Ukraine and Syria, each one in its own way, are such cracks. They fall between “world orders” if we accept Henry Kissinger’s description of the evolving international orders as being American, European, Chinese and Islamic (see also an interesting piece by Niall Ferguson on the Russian Question.) 

The “imperial” power of the collective West is shrinking. Under the new administration, Washington is proclaiming out loud what had previously been implied or mentioned quietly to America’s allies: the U.S. is not willing to serve as the world’s preeminent “imperialist” power indefinitely. It wants to be paid for its services or it will withdraw. 

President Donald Trump’s proposed deep cuts in the State Department’s funding and sharp hikes in military spending could be taken as a plan to relinquish America’s remaining soft power and concentrate on its hard power to protect whatever interests it chooses to keep.

In many ways Trump is the perfect puppet for Putin. He is an unsophisticated megalomaniac who lacks the vision to understand what America means to the world at large, and instead only cares about those who will hold rallies celebrating his isolationist agenda.

With Trump distracted by shiny objects Putin, and others, are free to take advantage of the opportunities for power and influence that slip from between Cheeto Hitler's chubby orange fingers.

And the cost for this country, and for our allies, will be vast and potentially irreversible.

There are almost 400 protest marches planned for the day after Trump's inauguration, with almost 200,000 participants.

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

Some 194,000 people have indicated on Facebook they plan to attend the Women’s March on Washington, scheduled for Saturday, the day after President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration. And 1,200 tour buses have applied for permits to park at RFK stadium that day ― six times the number that have applied for spots on the day of Trump’s swearing in. 

But march spokespeople say it would be a mistake to overlook the 370 smaller “sister marches” that have been planned in every state and on six continents that weekend ― and that are expected at last count to draw nearly 700,000 people. 

“This is a global movement,” national sister march spokeswoman Yordanos Eyoel told The Huffington Post. 

“This is something that was catalyzed by the organizers of the March on Washington, but it is a call to action to people across this country and around the world who believe in the same mission and principles,” she said.

There is a website that keeps track of where the marches are, when they start, and the number of participants.

In Alaska for instance there are marches planned in Anchorage, Fairbanks, Homer, Palmer, Bethel, Kodiak, Juneau, Ketchikan, Haines, Valdez, Kodiak, etc.

There are also marches planned in Canada, Belgium, Australia, Austria, Costa Rica, Denmark, Finland, France, German, etc..

Well you have to admit one thin, Donald Trump has certainly brought people from all over the world together.

Mostly women it seems, and definitely against him.

Sarah Palin, off her meds, and in full meltdown over the UN, Brexit, and One World government.

You might want to sit down for this one.

Courtesy of the Mat-Su Maniac's Facebook page:  

UN SHACKLES - PUT THEM ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK 

It may be tiresome to hear my repetitive warnings about the USA being shackled to the UN (Boy ain't that the truth!), but what I've said for years bears repeating. (No, not really.)We have not the money nor should we have the inclination to continue funding this Globalist circus that counters our best interest, ultimately endangering us and our allies. (Say what?)

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another... (Oooh, plagiarizing the Declaration of Independence. Bad form.)

The UK knew - it was that time. (And just look what it to their economy.)  And now is that time in the USA.

The Brexit referendum is akin to our own Declaration of Independence. (Oh God, somebody gives this poor idiot a history lesson.) May that refreshed spirit of sovereignty spread over the pond to America's shores! (Sarah Palin, why do you hate America?)

Congratulations, smart Brits. Good on you for ignoring all the fear mongering from special interest globalists who tend to aim for that apocalyptic One World Government (Ah, she's channeling Alex Jones again.) that dissolves a nation's self-determination and sovereignty... the EU being a One World Government mini-me. 

America can learn an encouraging lesson from this. (Yeah, don't fucking do it.)


It is time to dissolve political bands that connect us to agendas not in our best interest. May UN shackles be next on the chopping block. 

- Sarah Palin

You know reading this is kind of like taking a taxi ride with a driver all amped up on methamphetamine.  Only there are more sharp turns and sudden stops.

I find it more than a little interesting that the UN was originally created, with full support from the US just so you know, as a way to unite the world against the next Hitler like dictator who might rise to power and endanger the stability of the planet.

Yet now that we have our own Hitler like figure attempting to gain control over the country and spread anarchy through the world, he and his minions see it as job one to undermine, if not destroy, the very agency created to stop that from happening.

Donald Trump, and his groupie Sarah Palin, want to do away with the UN because they see it as an obstruction to their vision of the future.

And that should be something that terrifies us all.

47 of the world's poorest countries are committed to going 100% green between 2030 and 2050.

Courtesy of BBC: 

Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Haiti, among others, say they will update their national plans on cutting carbon before 2020. 

Delegates here welcomed the move, saying it was "inspirational". 

These two weeks of negotiations have been overshadowed to an extent by reaction to the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency. 

But in an effort to show that even the world's poorest countries are committed to dealing with global warming, the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) members have issued a promise to fully green their economies between 2030 and 2050. 

Termed the Marrakech Vision, the plan promises that the 47 members will: "strive to meet 100% domestic renewable energy production as rapidly as possible, while working to end energy poverty and protect water and food security, taking into consideration national circumstances".

Well look at that. The poorest nations on the planet are working to save the planet, while in America we just voted in a guy who thinks that climate change is a Chinese hoax. 

Once again the world moves forward, while America trips over its own feet.

The world reminds us that Donald Trump is not just America's problem.

How the five major religions spread across the world.

It's like watching five different strains of cancer fighting to see which can kill the host body first.

Is America crazy?

Courtesy of Common Dreams:  

Americans who live abroad -- more than six million of us worldwide (not counting those who work for the U.S. government) -- often face hard questions about our country from people we live among. Europeans, Asians, and Africans ask us to explain everything that baffles them about the increasingly odd and troubling conduct of the United States. Polite people, normally reluctant to risk offending a guest, complain that America’s trigger-happiness, cutthroat free-marketeering, and “exceptionality” have gone on for too long to be considered just an adolescent phase. Which means that we Americans abroad are regularly asked to account for the behavior of our rebranded “homeland,” now conspicuously in decline and increasingly out of step with the rest of the world.

In my long nomadic life, I’ve had the good fortune to live, work, or travel in all but a handful of countries on this planet. I’ve been to both poles and a great many places in between, and nosy as I am, I’ve talked with people all along the way. I still remember a time when to be an American was to be envied. The country where I grew up after World War II seemed to be respected and admired around the world for way too many reasons to go into here. 

That’s changed, of course. Even after the invasion of Iraq in 2003, I still met people -- in the Middle East, no less -- willing to withhold judgment on the U.S. Many thought that the Supreme Court’s installation of George W. Bush as president was a blunder American voters would correct in the election of 2004. His return to office truly spelled the end of America as the world had known it. Bush had started a war, opposed by the entire world, because he wanted to and he could. A majority of Americans supported him. And that was when all the uncomfortable questions really began.

Yeah you know after the election of 2004 I too thought that we must be crazy.

Here are a few of the questions that the author, Ann Jones, has been asked over the years:

• Why can’t you Americans stop interfering with women’s health care? 
• Why can’t you understand science? 
• How can you still be so blind to the reality of climate change? 
• How can you speak of the rule of law when your presidents break international laws to make war whenever they want? 
• How can you hand over the power to blow up the planet to one lone, ordinary man? 
• How can you throw away the Geneva Conventions and your principles to advocate torture? 
• Why do you Americans like guns so much? Why do you kill each other at such a rate? 
• To many, the most baffling and important question of all is: Why do you send your military all over the world to stir up more and more trouble for all of us?

You know in our defense I would like to suggest that America is not so much crazy, as it is schizophrenic. In many ways we are quite a reasonable, intelligent, progressive nation.

However sometimes we hear voices whispering in the dark. And those voices are not quite as reasonable, intelligent, nor progressive.

I call those voices "Republicans," and it seems to be that more and more these days they act like the Joker in "The Dark Knight" movie. And by that I mean, as Alfred Pennyworth explains, some men just want to watch the world burn.

So is America crazy?

Not always. But sometimes, yes most definitely.

News study says we are 99.99% sure that climate change is driven by mankind. Boy how hard do you think the deniers going to cling to that .01%?

Courtesy of The Conversation:  

There is less than 1 chance in 100,000 that global average temperature over the past 60 years would have been as high without human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, our new research shows. 

Published in the journal Climate Risk Management today, our research is the first to quantify the probability of historical changes in global temperatures and examines the links to greenhouse gas emissions using rigorous statistical techniques. 

Our new CSIRO work provides an objective assessment linking global temperature increases to human activity, which points to a close to certain probability exceeding 99.999%.

Okay you know this is way past the point of being something that we can continue to ignore. 

In Alaska this stopped being an academic argument decades ago.

We see it all around us, and so do many other people populating areas that are now nothing like they were during the time of their grandparents.

Hurricanes, tornadoes, drought, floods, all in places where they never happened before.

Climate Change denying has now taken on an almost fundamentalist fervor with those in that camp simply refusing to see the evidence literally smashing against their own windows or tearing at the foundations of their homes.

And now it may be too late for us to do anything substantive to ward off the changes that may put our very species in danger of extinction.

Great quote to start the day.

I love this quote because I remember as a child wondering what it felt like to be an adult, and having no idea why adults seemed so sad, and tired, and depressed all of the time.

I am still waiting to understand.

Perhaps my favorite quote by Sam Harris.

"To not believe in God is to know that it falls to us to make the world a better place."

Just think about that for a minute.

Imagine living in a world where people did not hate each other based on religious differences, everybody recognized that new and dangerous weather patterns were the result of man made pollutants and NOT gay marriage, and where each day was treasured as a precious moment in a finite existence and not simply time spent attempting to earn acceptance into some glorious afterlife.

Just imagine.

Other countries vote America the most significant threat to world peace. Well that's a little disheartening.

Source

Courtesy of RT:

The US has been voted as the most significant threat to world peace in a survey across 68 different countries. Anti-American sentiment was not only recorded in antagonistic countries, but also in many allied NATO partners like Turkey and Greece. 

A global survey conducted by the Worldwide Independent Network and Gallup at the end of 2013 revealed strong animosity towards the US’s role as the world’s policeman. Citizens across over 60 nations were asked: “Which country do you think is the greatest threat to peace in the world today?” 

The US topped the list, with 24 percent of people believing America to be the biggest danger to peace. Pakistan came second, with 8 percent of the vote and was closely followed by China with 6 percent. Afghanistan, Iran, Israel and North Korea came in joint fourth place with 5 percent of the vote. 

The threat from the US was rated most highly in the Middle East and North Africa, those areas most recently affected by American military intervention. Moreover, the survey showed that even Americans regard their country as a potential threat with 13 percent of them voting the US could disrupt global status quo.

I cannot tell you how much I want to get all indignant and say "Nuh uh!"  But honestly I can't do that.

We are indeed the biggest threat to world peace and only a nationalist moron from America, or as we call them, a Republican, would think otherwise.

I hoped against hope that once we had Obama in the White House our policies would change so that the rest of the world would respond to us with respect instead of fear, however to my great frustration that simply has not been the case.

At least not yet. 

A map of how those on the Right Wing see the world.

If image does not expand click here

You know this would be funnier if it were less true.

Final thought for the day.

Moments from this year that restore our faith in humanity.

Parents turn their child's wheelchair in Halloween costume.

Buzzfeed has put together 26 moments that restored their faith in humanity.

Here are a few:

New York City cop buys boots for barefoot homeless man.

Man supports best friend as he relieves arthritis pain in lake.

Doctor provides free medical care after Hurricane Sandy

There are many more, and if you want to see them pleawse visit the link at the top.

I think after the last few days we can ALL benefit from a reminder of just how many good people there are in the world.

Forbes names President Obama "The World's Most Powerful Person." Do you hear that Republicans?

"Who's the bad ass? Why I'm the bad ass, thanks for asking.

Courtesy of Forbes Magazine:  

To compile the list, we considered hundreds of candidates from various walks of life all around the globe, and measured their power along four dimensions. 

First, we asked whether the candidate has power over lots of people.  

Next we assessed the financial resources controlled by each person. 

Then we determined if the candidate is powerful in multiple spheres. 

Lastly, we made sure that the candidates actively used their power. 

U.S. President Barack Obama emerged, unanimously, as the world’s most powerful person, for the second year running. Obama was the decisive winner of the 2012 U.S. presidential election, and now he gets four more years to push his agenda.The President faces major challenges, including an unresolved budget crisis, stubbornly high unemployment and renewed unrest in the Middle East. But Obama remains the unquestioned commander in chief of the world’s greatest military, and head of its sole economic and cultural superpower. 

Oh yeah!

I think we should send this article to every obstructionist teabagging Republican politician in Washington and remind them that THIS is the man that won the election, THIS is the man with all the power, and THIS is the man to whom they better start showing some damn respect!

No more obstructionism, no more yelling "You lie" when he addresses Congress, and no more of this kind of shit:

The man has earned a second term, he demonstrated his ability to do the job, and he has earned the respect of the entire world.